Bauer Gear Motor looks to fall in line with regulations

Altra Industrial Motion’s Bauer Gear Motor has released the Permanent Magnetic Synchronous Motors (PMSM) range of motors that fall in line with new IE4 energy efficiency standards.

IE4 energy efficiency standards have forced manufacturers to deliver motors that meet regulations. In a press release, Altra Industrial Motion said that while many manufacturers were talking about releasing motors that met regulations, few were delivering on this, leading to these motors coming at a premium price.

Motors that meet IE4 energy efficiency standards are usually permanent magnet arrangements, where the permanent magnets maintain their own persistent magnetic fields and are generally made from rare earth metals. Conversely, the materials are not particularly rare, they just happen to come from the class of metals known as rare earth metals. They are, however, more expensive to manufacture and significantly more powerful than standard magnets. When used in a motor application, the motors usually require an inverter drive to power the motor, but the efficiency can be very high, of the order of 96%.

This is not just conjecture; an end user in Germany carried out a direct product comparison test to see how Bauer’s IE4, super premium efficiency PMSM performed against a standard asynchronous motor. The test was carried out on a Hüber disc thickener at a wastewater treatment plant in Germany in partnership with inverter drive specialist Danfoss. Once installed the motor from Bauer was found to operate with 87.7% efficiency and delivered energy savings of almost 40%.

Markus Kutny, product specialist for Bauer Gear Motor PMSM, said: “In today’s market, energy efficiency has to be one of the key determining factors when specifying geared motor solutions. Energy prices are only going to go one way so it is important that a drive’s lifelong running costs are considered; rather than simply the cost of procurement. We have developed the new motor range in anticipation of the new IE4 classification and to offer our customers the very best in terms of efficiency.”

Bauer Gear Motor’s range of PMSM's already fulfil the requirements of the soon-to-be-implemented IE4 (Super Premium Efficiency) classification. This is evidenced by their potential to achieve energy savings of up to 40% compared to an IE2 inverter-driven squirrel cage motor.

The PMSM series is an environmentally friendly range of motors, employing a highly efficient design of rotor that integrates embedded permanent magnets made from the rare-earth material, instead of the squirrel-cage rotor found in induction motors. This design offers a number of key benefits. It reduces heat losses from the rotor by 100%, total losses by approximately 25%, and increases total efficiency by 10% or more. For the PMSM user, this improved performance translates into lower total cost of ownership, a reduction in CO₂ emissions, and ongoing savings that buffer against future increases in energy costs.

PMSM's offer improved efficiency when compared to induction motors, even under partial load conditions; and extremely high efficiency under rated operating conditions. They also have considerably higher power density, which, for geared motors, yields higher system efficiency with minimal installation volume – and also reduced weight. Importantly PMSM drives can produce higher torques for the same installation volume as conventional induction motors, a factor that allows cost saving, through the ability to specify a smaller motor size in some applications.

Bauer’s PMSM motors maintain high efficiency levels within a wide partial load range, up to a load factor of 1:5.

The synchronous design of the PMSM motors means that they maintain constant speed, independent of load.

The PMSM motor series is available in ventilated and non-ventilated configurations across the power range from 0.55 kW to 15 kW. They operate on 380 V to 500 V power supplies, and are rated for inverter duty, offering an extended speed range with constant torque.

Adapted from press release by Sam Dodson

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcoal.com/product-news/07032014/new_efficient_motor_from_bauer_gear_motor_pr20/